>> if that was the intention, it's useless anyway, given the >> posix-specified -- for all argument parsing. > > About that: > > $ echo -- hello > -- hello > $ /bin/echo -- hello > -- hello > > _I'm_ doing it, but the gnu tools aren't, and nobody seems to have cared. > > Posix does not seem to be aware that it's been losing traction for a > while now. My own last attempt to engage with the posix mailinglist made > it as far as:
I'm pretty sure that's for backward compatibility, not because the bash or GNU coreutils maintainers are ignorant of POSIX or don't care. There is an in-depth discussion of echo in the book "Portable Shell Scripting" I referred to: https://books.google.com/books?id=3ETiIJG1UB4C&pg=PA183&lpg=PA183&dq=portable+shell+scripting+public+enemy+1+echo&source=bl&ots=1Ps1NAaM-1&sig=_KN0uPhyVvceuZwojK5ysJtDyng&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwjjgvzCuajMAhWruoMKHYNrAOwQ6AEIHDAA#v=onepage&q=portable%20shell%20scripting%20public%20enemy%201%20echo&f=false Hopefully that is readable, but the gist is that sometimes -n is a flag and sometimes it is echo'd; same thing with -- I guess. Apparently "echo" is one of the most un-portable builtins in practice. I think he suggests using printf instead of echo somewhere. This book actually goes into some detail about historical bugs in different shells... Andy _______________________________________________ Toybox mailing list [email protected] http://lists.landley.net/listinfo.cgi/toybox-landley.net
